Busy summer, but they all are.  I’m blogging about my current activitybecause it’s relevant since it’s still happening. I’m in the middle of a week on Martha’s Vineyard, MA, spending time trying to catch some good light and to relax.  Sometimes those two things are mutually exclusive.   Very hot, sitting on porch of B & B and listening to a DJ on the beach right in front of me — pretty nice.   Yesterday we had the quintessential beach experience out o Aquinnah, formerly known as Gay Head, the center of the Wampanoag Nation.  I love the history of this island.  The famous red clay cliffs were at their finest, and the gentle waves lulled us with our yummy snacks and wine.  It’s quite a hike to get out there, but well worth it.  We were the totally last folks on the beach and sadly made our way out in near darkness.  Almost a spiritual experience.   Atached are a few images from my photographic efforts this week.  I’m trying a new technique of dream-like beach portraits.  Have to make hay while the sun shines because Hurricane Earl is on the way!

In case you don’t know me, I’ll parcel out some factoids in scattered posts about me in no special order.

I have 2 kids, Adam and Jenny.  Adam is 27, living and working in NYC.  With a Summa Cum Laude in English, he is head meat cutter at Dicksons Farmstand Meats www.dicksonsfarmstand.com in Chelsea Market.  www.chelseamarket.com He currently writes about meat on Mark Bittman’s blog. www.markbittman.com

Jenny is 23 and graduating from McGill University in Montréal with honors next week.  Major: International Development, Minor:  African Studies.  This fall she heads to Columbia University in NYC for a Masters in Public Health with a Global Health concentration.   She’s spending her last summer in Montréal, working at Dundees Bar & Grill, playing Ultimate Frisbee and volunteering at Amandla, a radio program focused on African news and current affairs.

Here’s a post about my early photographic and camera-ownership history.  I had at least one camera at a time throughout my whole life.  First one was a small Kodak Brownie that accompanied me to camp, school, and everywhere.  From that period, there are negatives, black & white prints and photo albums floating around in boxes somewhere in the house.  Recently, my sister gave me a vintage Kodak Brownie as an Xmas present that I display on a book shelf.  My next cameras weren’t anything special; probably the little 1960s compact cameras that everyone had and that used flash cubes.  (Remember those?)

As a freshman in college in 1969, I bought a Hanimex Practika, my first SLR.  Discovering its shortcomings caused me to trade it in for a Pentax Spotmatic, which I have today in working condition!  That’s the older version of the Pentax K-1000 which was around until the last few years before digital took over.  From there, I went to my last film camera, a Canon F-1, which lasted me from probably the mid-1980s through 2006.  Quite a work horse.

I got my first digital camera around 2004, a rangefinder called an Olympus Camedia 5060, on which I learned to navigate my way around the digital world sufficiently to know I was destined to join the digital camera movement.  Since I have had two Canon digital SLRs – the 5D and the new 5D Mark II.  I’m a satisfied convert for the most part, but there will never be anything like a projector lamp shining through a piece of slide emulsion.

More thoughts next time.

I’m starting my blogging adventure on Thursday May 20, 2010.  I haven’t read many blogs so it’s hard to know what you guys out there may want to read about.  Sometimes I’ll write about developing ideas for creating images, sometimes I’ll write about the other more boring stuff I have to do to keep getting my work out there..  But if you find this, subscribe to my blog and tell me what you want to hear about!

I have to give credit where credit’s due… my daughter, Jenny, has been 110% instrumental in helping me join the 21st century, with regard to setting up this blog, my Facebook page, and doing much of the donkey work to get dozens of my images formatted and ready for my new website.  I’ll talk more about my web designer in another post.